February 20, 2026: God’s Got Me
This one’s part brain dump, part emotion, part gratitude and part me trying to make sense of it all. Stay with me.
Last Friday was a great day. Until it wasn’t.
Borrowing from barn mate Katie Smith’s movement and mantra, all I can say is this: God’s got me.
If you haven’t read Katie and her husband’s story, go to godsgotme.co and buy their merch too. Their faith is bold and contagious. I truly believe that faith, not just theirs but many of ours, covers our barn.
Because it covered me.
It started as one of those perfect riding days. Four of us set out across the 100 acres our horses call home. Bee and me. Bethany and Bentley. Brenda and Jeffy. Connie and Zeva.
Three miles at a steady 2.7 mph. About 57 feet per minute. Calm. Rhythmic. Bee was steady. No jigging. No attitude. We rode at the back giving everyone what I call Covid-length room for safety.
I remember thinking, We’ve finally turned a corner.
Even Connie commented on how well Bee did.
Back 40 bliss with Bethany (far left), Brenda (far right) and Connie in the lead.
Character development, color-coded.
Teal: “We’ve matured.”
Pink: “Never mind.”
The first half of that little magenta squiggle?
That’s 20.9 mph of character development.
The speeds referenced at the bottom are averages and very debatable, they are for reference only.
At the end of the ride, Bethany and I decided to lope a few circles in the west arena. A lane we’ve mastered. An arena we know.
From the start, Bee felt fresh. Antsy, but manageable. I stopped her. Backed her up. Took exaggerated deep breaths. Waited for the sigh. She softened.
We walked. I asked for a trot. Then a lope.
One circle. Two circles. Three circles…….
On the backside of that third loop, she bolted out the arena’s open gate.
Yes. The open gate. Close the gate. Barn Management 101.
FIRE BREATHING DRAGON IN THE ARENA
Let’s break it down what our work in the arena looked like:
A - We enter the arena calm and begin our first circle (1).
1 - You can see the circle is a short trot and I ask for a lope, head starts flailing in the pink so I slow her to a walk and stop (B).
B - We stand there for at least a minute, probably more. I purposely take deep breaths to calm her and wait for her to release a long breath indicating she’s ready to listen. She does and starts licking her bit, another indication she’s ready to work.
2 - Second loop, hot lope (pink), break her down to a trot (yellow), she lopes again without me asking (pink) so I make her walk (teal).
3 - Third circle we trot at a decent pace (yellow), I ask for a lope (pink) I get a run.
C - We exit the arena at increasing speed, who left the gate open?
My feet flew out of the stirrups. That’s number one on my list. I do not have a confident seat without my feet anchored. I tried to ride it out. Tried the emergency stop. Tried multiple one-rein stops. She was thrashing her head and accelerating.
She’s barrel bred. Fast circles mean accelerate on the exit and head home.
A few more strides toward the trees and I made a split-second decision to emergency dismount.
From the right side.
It looked nothing like practice.
It was more slide, conscious release of the reins, loss of footing, limbs airborne, tuck-and-roll maybe, head hits dirt.
I call this “The Path of Destruction”
Black.
I don’t know if I fully lost consciousness, but I lost time. I opened my eyes to EO staff around me. Calm. Prepared. Efficient.
They loaded me into the side-by-side. Well, less dramatically, I got in under my own strength.
First aid administered at the barn, ice pack in place. Jim was out of town. Providentially, Payton had the day off. Connie called my daughter, gave her the address of where she was taking me and then Connie drove me to Medical City ER Argyle. Payton must have been speeding because she got there before we had any paperwork filled out. Connie exits to hopefully partake in Lupe’s Nacho-bar birthday lunch (that’s a reason by itself to be mad at Bee, missing the Nacho-bar!) Anti-nausea meds quickly. CT scan quickly. The longest wait was for the CT results.
No skull fracture. No brain bleed. No neck injury. No broken bones. Well, I may have broken ribs but they can’t do anything for them so I skipped the x-rays and expense.
At nearly 57 years old. Tell me that’s not God covering.
“Mild concussion.” Which, by the way, is largely diagnosed by ruling out everything worse. The knot on the back of my head developed fast. The missing memory scares me more than the fall.
I left dirt everywhere. On the CT scanner. On the hospital bed. In Payton’s car. In Connie’s car. On our bathroom floor. I’m fairly certain I left some as a donation to the emergency department.
And because I apparently like data, I had Equilab running.
I downloaded the app at the beginning of the year to make sure I wasn’t overworking Bee. Responsible horse mom energy. It tracks everything. Distance. Gaits. Transitions. Tempo. Stride. Elevation. Average speed. Top speed.
It also tracked 21 seconds of questionable decision-making.
Our top speed? 20.9 mph.
There’s a neat little spike in the graph. That spike represents approximately 21 seconds of me yelling “whoa,” pulling leather, attempting emergency stops, and negotiating with a horse who had fully committed to home.
Not terror.
More like 21 seconds of “Bee, please be reasonable.”
Equilab does not include a category for existential reflection.
Bee ran straight back to the barn.
Did she stop to check on me? No.
Am I mad? Very much yes.
We have grown so much this year. I thought we had built trust. In my mind, a horse that trusts you listens to you. My friend’s horse stops when she takes her feet out of the stirrups.
Mine increased speed.
This one stings.
Was she malicious? I don’t think horses plot revenge. But she is wired for speed. There is a difference between a bad horse and a hot horse.
A bad horse seeks harm. A hot horse seeks motion. Hot horses are athletes with adrenaline. And sometimes adrenaline wins.
I replayed it all night. I feel embarrassed. I feel judged, even though my barn mates have shown nothing but concern and empathy. Many riders at EO are incredibly experienced on highly trained, expensive horses. They grew up riding.
The judgment? It’s in my own head.
I am not riding a pleasure-bred packer.
I briefly considered selling her as “gently used, fast, lightly homicidal.”
I briefly considered buying a neon pink helmet along with bubble wrap for the rest of me and just accepting that I ride a dragon.
I briefly considered enrolling her in finishing school for barrel horses who need to learn emotional regulation.
I also briefly considered sending her to the glue factory.
All of that lasted about twelve minutes.
The truth is, my heart keeps saying, “We’re not done. But something has to change.”
Bee was purchased to be a barrel lesson and pleasure horse for me. That was the plan. We continued lessons with Ashley exactly as intended. And as readers well know, we’ve learned a lot along the way. Some of it humbling. Some of it hilarious. Some of it expensive.
My barn mates? Many of them say sell her. They say she’s a barrel horse who doesn’t get to do what she loves. That maybe I’m asking her to be something she isn’t.
And that hits.
So I had Sarah Salter, our resident western discipline trainer, get on her in the arena.
Let me tell you something. Bee worked up a sweat. And not from laziness. From energy. From tension. From using the reactive side of her brain far more often than the thinking side.
That needs to change.
Sarah says Bee is a lot of horse. Not bad. Not mean. Not ruined. Just… a lot.
Is she trainable? Yes.
Am I trainable? Also yes.
Will it all come together perfectly? Will she never take off with me on her again?
Sarah can’t promise that.
No one can.
And that’s where the decision gets heavy.
Do I keep her and invest in more training? Do I rise to meet her? Do I learn to ride the horse I actually have instead of wishing she were a slow-headed pleasure packer?
Or am I doing her a disservice by asking a barrel-bred mare to poke along behind western pleasure horses with their heads low and zero interest in anything beyond hay and vibes?
I don’t know.
What I do know is that I love her. We have grown so much together this year. She has taught me more than any “easy” horse ever could.
But love doesn’t eliminate reality.
If it hadn’t rained Saturday, I would already have been back in the round pen. Gate closed. Helmet on. Yes, helmet on. That conversation is shifting for me.
Bee may be going to training. Not because she’s bad. Because she’s powerful. And power without refinement is just speed.
The question isn’t whether she can change.
The question is whether I can.
And whether we’re the right fit for each other long term.
That’s still up in the air.
And it’s not a small decision.
Because this is what riding really is.
Falls happen. At EO we’ve had riders come off from spooks more than spunk. It’s part of riding. Thankfully, nothing serious. Every time we swing a leg over, we accept a level of risk.
But I walked away.
God’s got me.
Today. Every day.
It’s been a few days now.
And I am sore. AF.
I am fairly certain I broke a rib. Laying on my right side? No. Deep breathing? Also no. Laughing? Absolutely not. Sneezing? Terrifying. The lump on the back of my head is down but still tender. I’ve got bruising in places I didn’t know I hit and road rash on my back left shoulder, elbow, and the top of my tailbone.
And apparently I do, in fact, have abs. Obliques. Inner thighs. Chest muscles. Biceps. Glutes. Back muscles. Who knew? I didn’t. Bee found all of them for me. And barn trainer Sarah said, “that’s a heck of a way to find out you have them.” Which gave me a good giggle.
Meanwhile, Bee spent Saturday out in the rain and has clearly rolled at least twelve times. She is a muddy masterpiece. A swamp creature. A feral pasture goblin.
I went to see her Sunday and, if I’m honest, I was a little more shaken than I expected to be. Just walking her up from the pasture made me hyper-aware. Not panicked. Not quitting. Just aware.
Right now, I am in no physical condition to negotiate sass from her or any of the other pasture mares with attitude and lack of sense. So we’re laying low this week. I’m healing. She’ll get a bath. There will be round pen work. Quiet resets. No heroics.
Sometimes leadership looks like pushing through.
Sometimes leadership looks like sitting down.
This week, I’m choosing the second one.
Bravery isn’t the absence of fear. It’s walking back through the pasture gate anyway.
Until next week,
Christina and one very (comment with your favorite adjective!) mare